Chronicle

Ever since the breakout success of 1999's The Blair Witch Project, the found footage film has become a subgenre in its own right. In a similar vein to Blair Witch, the Paranormal Activity series has found great financial success with their comparatively meagre budgets, and Cloverfield in 2008 proved that, even on a larger scale, the handycam aesthetic can deliver effective thrills when employed by filmmakers who have a solid understanding of the style. Josh Trank's Chronicle represents an evolution of the found footage genre, taking the character as cameraman conceit to interesting new places, and marking the director as a young talent worth monitoring.

Chronicle differs from predecessors like Cloverfield in the sense that this handycam footage isn't presented as 'found' per se, but rather is a stylistic and narrative choice which puts a refreshingly original spin on a well overdone story: the superhero origin. After encountering a strange, glowing object in a deep underground cave, high schoolers Andrew (Dane DeHaan), Matt (Alex Russell) and Steve (Michael B. Jordan) discover they have telekinetic powers which allow them to move objects with their mind. Matt considers the powers to be like a muscle, which can be strengthened through training, and after beginning small eventually the trio build superhuman strength and, to their delight, the ability to fly. The special effects betray a small budget at times, but the initial flying sequences are breathlessly entertaining, and the pure joy of the characters makes them more effective than most mega-budget blockbusters. These are meant to be regular kids, and although the story loses focus as the scale grows towards the climax, the early scenes are surprisingly genuine and affecting. But make no mistake, this is an origin story (one which doesn't necessarily beg for a sequel however), and Trank and his co-writer Max Landis (son of John Landis) use the visceral, in-your-face nature of the found footage to breathe life into a genre which has come dangerously close to wearing out its welcome in the past decade.

As is the case with almost all science-fiction, a lot more can be read into Chronicle than what is happening on the surface. Aside from the excitement of fighting and flying about, there is a very real human story at work, with a lot of teenage life's triumphs and tragedies. Trank and Landis clearly poured their own experiences into the film, with the three leads seeming like people from everyone's high school years. Added to this is a nice element of self-reflexivity as Andrew, an unpopular misfit, uses his camera to define himself, and how he sees the world. The old adage about writing what you know seems to ring true in the case of Chronicle, and seeing Andrew learn to move his camera in more dynamic ways thanks to his new found powers is perhaps the tiniest hint of autobiography from Trank. The film is filled with subtle aspects such as this which will probably be missed by most, but thankfully simply taking Chronicle at face value is a rewarding experience, proving that the superhero origin story is not dead, it just needs a good shake up from time to time.

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The next in a long line of "found footage" flicks that have been flooding our cinemas over the last few years, Chronicle breaks free of the usual constraints within that sub genre to concoct a truly memorable sci-fi thriller. Retracing the steps of three teenage friends who are gifted with telekinesis after a chance encounter with something (intelligently, the movie never stipulates what exactly), the story focuses on the varying paths they take with their new found talent, but not until they have had some juvenile fun with it first. This is an amazingly accomplished debut feature for writer-director Josh Trank (who co-penned the script with Max "son of John" Landis); his technical veracity is utterly mind-blowing – especially when you consider the shoestring funds he had to work with – and his narrative pacing is impeccable. The icing on the already yummy cake is the marvellous CGI that allows our protagonists to fly, crush cars and stop baseballs in mid air – all seamlessly and photo-realistically. Chronicle is a tremendous achievement in low-budget, big-concept filmmaking.

I last saw this film over a decade ago, and it was one of my earliest introductions to the first-person POV scene. I also vividly remember being impressed by it, so much so that I kept thinking about the story and its characters for weeks afterwards.

It had definitively left its mark, and seeing this again after eleven years, my impression seems not to have changed even slightly. I loved this movie back in my childhood, and that same admiration has carried to the present times, as it seems.

Albeit It hurts to see this being film so underrated, this certainly deserves more love. It is one of the most overlooked as well as underappreciated science fiction features of the last decade!

P. S. Dane DeHaan as Andrew was freaking incredible here, one of the most effective Anti-Hero parts ever written and played on screen, period.

I'm normally not a big fan of the handycam filming technique. In the beginning it was all new and okay but personally I think they should stop that technique. It doesn't do movies any good. Not that Chronicle is a bad movie though. It's definitely something else then the usual superhero movies that we see so much lately. Here three kids get telekinetic super powers after discovering a strange thing underground. What starts as a bit of fun quickly escalates in catastrophes. The story is easy to follow. It's different then the usual action heroes that use their powers to fight evil. The actors are all quite young and are not bad. Thinking about what they do with their powers makes me realize that I would probably try the same things. But it's all fiction. So all in all it's an entertaining movie to watch.

One day a loner kid whose mother is dying and his injured former-firefighter dad abuses him decides to film everything. That ostracizes him more from him peers because he runs around everywhere with some giant camera on this shoulder.

After a party his philosophizing cousin and another friend ask him to film what they found- a large perfectly circular hole in the ground. They jump into it and follow along the cave to find some alien looking giant glowing mineral. Something happens and the the filming is interrupted.

When the filming continues after some time we find them in the backyard controlling a baseball with their minds. Since the incident, they've developed telekinesis. At first with small objects, then larger ones, then themselves. They take their powers public bothering innocent people in stores and parking lots. Then they lean how to levitate and eventually fly.

When the poor loner kid's mom is one the verge of dying, the kid puts on a protective suit and tries to rob a gas station to get meds for his mom. On his way out, the attendant shoots at him; an explosion ensues and the kid catches on fire. He ends up in the hospital. Even there, and after the mom's death, the father will blame him and try to abuse him. The kid loses it completely. Having realized he's an apex predator and that the strong destroy the weak, he's now ready to unleash his powers and destroy all who get in his way. It's left to his cousin to try and stop him.

Chronicle overall has a good idea. It's entertaining to watch the kids develop and tame their powers and experimenting with them out there in the world. The filming is part POV, part third person because fortunately, the kid learns to control cameras and has them swarming around him. Thankfully, even when he has his old camera, the quality of the footage is excellent- unlike those poor bastards in horror movies who are forever condemned to film stuff in dismal quality grainy video. So at least that makes the POV stuff tolerable. But Chronicle retains the weaknesses of that kind of movie. It's boring at times, the portrayal of relationships overall is pretty poor- the relationship between the cousin and some girl is just awful, and eventually you end up with people just screaming at each other. Still, the entertaining aspects outweigh the negatives and this movie offers something we don't see often.